Celine’s hand shot to his mouth to stop the rest of the words from flowing out. Her ears perked.
“Celine?”
Jacques must have come outside to search for her.
“Merde,” she muttered under her breath and felt Bastien’s lips curl into a smile against her palm. She had half a mind to slap that cocky grin off his face, but thesmackwould give their position away. “Utter one sound,” Celine mouthed, “and I will find the dullest knife your cook has and cut off your tongue. Understood?”
Bastien’s eyebrows knitted distraughtly, but he moved his head slowly in a nod.
Good.
Jacques’s footfalls stopped.
Celine held her breath. She could feel Bastien’s heart thud against her chest, while his eyes used the moonlight that filtered through the leaves to study her face. Caught off guard, her palm slipped, freeing his lips.
That’s all he needed.
“I wonder what he’ll do if he finds us like this,” Bastien whispered, his words a slur of inebriation. Celine brought her hand up again, but he caught it swiftly in his. Then turned them around, lithely pinning her arms above her head. “Or like this. I have to admit, I expected more heated protests on your part, Celine.” To their left, the dogs had started barking again, demanding Jacques’s attention. Bastien glanced in their direction, then back at Celine. He assessed her, mouth kickingup in amusement. “Maybe we should let him find us like this. It will bring a quick end to those engagement plans, that’s for sure. And considering you don’t love him…I would be doing you a favour, really.”
“Stop talking,” she seethed, her temper boiling.
“Come on, Celine. Be a good sport. Stay.” Suddenly, his hand let go of hers and dropped to her hip, sneaking around her waist to where her dress dipped so low that her entire spine stood bare. He dropped his head lower, brushing his lips against her neck. “Tell me”—he whispered, nudging his mouth to leave small kisses along her collarbone—“do you get goosebumps when Jacques touches you, or is the privilege only mine?”
Celine’s fingers curled into fists, gathering the fabric around them until her knuckles turned white.
“Does he even know how?” Bastien pushed. “I could show you if you want, teach you a thing or two you can do with him. Consider it a friendly gift.” Celine could feel her blood rushing through her veins; her heart pounding mutely, as though the sound was coming from inside her head. She didn’t know why she wasn’t moving. Maybe the champagne she drank had finally reached her brain. Bastien chuckled darkly. “You will certainly make for a better distraction than Jeanne ever could.”
Jacques’s last echo of her name snapped like a pair of scissors through her thoughts. All her previous anger returned. Celine’s skin grew cold, no more crawling with invisible fingers, even if Bastien was still running patterns all over her back with the pad of his thumb.
“No, she is not in the garden,” Jacques’s voice floated distantly from the open balcony doors.
Once she heard his footsteps retrace back inside, Celine made to step away, but Bastien didn’t let go of her wrist. “Stay,” he whispered.
“Forget it.”
His grip tightened. “Stay. What’s one girl for another?”
Celine’s lips curled in disgust. “This is what you had in mind when you said you wanted to be friends?”
“Honestly,” he assessed her, “I was imagining you with less clothes.”
Freeing her left hand at last, Celine collided it with his cheek. The slap echoed through the empty garden. Hyde and Jekyll started barking from their kennel. Bastien swayed backwards from the impact.
“You forget who you’re talking to,” she gritted vehemently. “If you think you can pull stuff like this and expect me to keep quiet every single time, you’re wrong. I’ve only played along because of the competition—”
“Because you need me,” Bastien corrected, pulling his hand away from his face. An angry mark flared red above his cheekbone.
A satisfied smile tugged at the corners of her lips. “So do you,” Celine reminded him calmly. “Touch me like that again and our deal is over.”
“Like I care.”
“Really? So your grandfather called today to beg you to return home?”
It only took a few simple words to swipe an invisible hand over Bastien’s mien and straighten it into something sober and awfully serious.
“What, you’re not used to someone talking back?” she taunted. “I can play dirty, too.”
Bastien scoffed. He gave her a once over and stepped away from the pillar. “You’re too much work, Celine. It’s not worth my time.”
